WebKitGTK+

WebKitGTK+ is a completely free, versatile, powerful and open source command-line software that aims to port the powerful WebKit rendering engine to the GTK+ GUI toolkit and, of course, the GNOME graphical desktop environment.

The project incorporates WebKit's full functionality through a set of GObject-based APIs (Application Programming Interfaces), and it is suitable for applications that require any type of web integration, from mature web browsers to hybrid HTML/CSS apps.

Used in Epiphany, Midori, and other powerful apps

WebKitGTK+ is successfully used in popular and powerful applications that work under the GNOME desktop environment or require the GTK+ toolkit, such as the Epiphany and Midor web browsers.

The project is very useful on both desktop and embedded systems, it supports WebKit2, and allows developers to easily build applications that rely on the web platform for increased responsiveness and security.

Uses process separation to support GTK+2 plugins on GTK+3 apps

Another interesting feature is process separation, which is used by WebKitGTK+ to seamlessly support plugins that are written in the 2.x branch of GTK+, such as Adobe Flash Player, in GTK+3 apps.

In addition, WebKitGTK+ offers full support for video and audio streams in web pages through the GStreamer WebKit backend, supports the HTML canvas element, supports WebRTC and WebAudio technologies, as well as accelerated rendering and 3D CSS.

Under the hood

Among WebKitGTK+'s runtime requirements (be aware that the list will change in time, as the project evolves), we can mention GTK+ 3.6.0 or later, gail 3.0 or later, GLib 2.36.0 or higher, libsoup 2.42.0 or later, Cairo 1.10 or higher, Pango 1.30.0 or higher, libxml or later 2.6, fontconfig 2.5 or later, FreeType2 or higher 9.0, and libsecret.

Moreover, depending on your configuration options WebKitGTK+ may also require GObject introspection 1.32.0 or higher, libxslt 1.1.7 or later, SQLite 3.0 or later, GStreamer 1.0.3 or higher, gstreamer-plugins-base 1.0.3 or later, Enchant 0.22 or later, Clutter, as well as Clutter GTK+.

What is new in this release:

• Improve CPU usage when rendering under Wayland in accelerated compositing mode.
• Improve the memory consumption of the UI process under Wayland.
• Fix rendering issues in some web sites with accelerated compositing enabled.
• Fix a web process crash when closing the WebView.
• Initialize libgcrypt in the network process too.
• Show controls if a video element isn't allowed to play inline.
• Add support for cookies and screenshots commands in WebDriver.
• Fix several crashes and rendering issues.
• Translation updates: Brazilian Portuguese, Polish.

What is new in version 2.8.4:

• Make WebSQL work by using a default quota instead of always failing in openDatabase with DOM Exception 18.
• Improve detection and usage of GL/GLES/EGL libraries.
• Fix a crash on memory allocation using bmalloc on 32bit systems.
• Fix DOCUMENT_VIEWER cache model to actually disable the memory cache.
• Fix a WebProcess crash after too many redirect error when there's an active NPAPI plugin.
• Fix a WebProcess crash when gtk-font-name setting is empty.
• Ensure Math.abs() doesn't return negative.
• Correctly restore accelerated compositing after a WebProcess crash.
• Respect X-Frame-Options headers when loading from application cache.
• Several crashes and rendering issues fixed.
• Fix the MIPS N64 detection.
• Fix several memory leaks.
• Translation updates: Catalan.

What is new in version 2.8.0:

• Initial gestures support.
• HTML5 notifications.
• User script messages.
• HTML5 color input.
• APNG support.
• Performance improvements.
• Playing audio notification signal.
• Web view background colors.

What is new in version 2.4.8:

• Fix SSL connection issues with some websites after the POODLE vulnerability fix.
• Fix a crash when loading flash plugins.
• Fix build on GNU Hurd
• Fix build on OS X.
• Fix documentation of webkit_print_operation_get_page_setup().
• Security fixes: CVE-2014-1344, CVE-2014-1384, CVE-2014-1385, CVE-2014-1386, CVE-2014-1387, CVE-2014-1388, CVE-2014-1389, CVE-2014-1390.

What is new in version 2.7.3:

• Add API to support HTML5 notifications.
• Add UserMedia Permission Request API.
• GObject DOM bindings API now correctly returns NULL intead of empty strings to be able to differentiate between not present and present but empty.
• Add support for text-decoration-skip.
• Improve the HTTP authentication dialog.
• Expose the ID attribute of Meter and Option elements to accessibility.
• Use latin1 instead of UTF-8 for HTTP header values.
• Update NavigationItemProbes inspector icon.
• Add video/mp2t as alternative mimetype for MPEG TS.
• Add application/x-mpegurl and video/flv to the list of supported mimetypes.
• Add SCHEDULING query support to HTTP media source element.
• Fix deadlock when shutting down AudioDestination.
• Translation updates: Kannada, Assamese

What is new in version 2.3.4:

• Add API to WebKitResponsePolicyDecision to check if the MIME type can be shown.
• Enable fullscreen API by default.
• Fix handling of HTTP certificates with the network process enabled.
• Fix downloads with the network process enabled.
• Fix handling of cookies when network process is enabled.
• Remove the partial file downloaded when the download operation fails or is cancelled.
• Make WebKitWebPage::send-request signal work after a redirect.
• Add xdg.origin.url extended attribute to downloads in WebKit2.
• Fix WebGL with GLES.
• Translation updates: Dutch, Brazilian Portuguese.

What is new in version 2.2.4:

• Disable MemoryCache when the DOCUMENT_VIEWER cache model is set.
• Remove the partial file downloaded when the download operation fails or is cancelled.
• Enable Web Audio by default in configure.
• Add missing mappings from ARIA roles to ATK roles.
• Fix several crashes when printing via JavaScript.
• Fix an X11 error when the backing store surface is destroyed.
• Fix the user agent string to correctly pretend to be Mac OS X to fix several web sites that depen on the user agent like yahoo.
• Fix the build with wayland support disabled.
• Fix the build in FreeBSD.
• Fix the build in Mac/Darwin.
• Fix the build with GCC in i386.

What is new in version 2.3.3:

• Initial Network Process support disabled by default.
• CSS regions are now enabled by default.
• Support right-side attachment of the inspector in WebKit2.
• Add spatial navigation setting to WebKit2 GTK+ API.
• Add media source setting to both WebKit1 and WebKit2.
• Support custom types for drag and drop data.
• Avoid extra copy when drawing images in cairo backend.
• Fix scrolling in combo boxes when the dropdown menu is larger than the screen.
• Render AC layers also when using GTK+ 2 in WebKit1.
• Fix return value of webkit_web_view_get_view_source_mode() in WebKit1.
• Emit stream-start, caps and segment events in webkitwebaudiosrc element.
• Fix seeking on media content provided by servers not supporting range requests.
• Fix a crash when using media source in GStreamer media backend.
• Fix an X11 error when the backing store surface is destroyed.
• Expose splitter elements with ATK_ROLE_SEPARATOR to accessibility.
• Expose accessibility objects WAI-ARIA landmark roles.
• Expose accessibility objects with ATK_ROLE_ARTICLE.
• Expose accessibility objects with ATK_ROLE_CHECK_MENU_ITEM.
• Remove support for GStreamer 0.10.
• Memory leak due to incorrect use of gst_tag_list_merge in TextCombinerGStreamer.
• Translation updates: Brazilian Portuguese.

What is new in version 2.3.2:

• Add enable-media-stream setting to WebKit2 GTK+ API.
• Fix a crash when load fails due to SSL errors in WebKit2.
• Fix a crash when printing via JavaScript in WebKit2.
• Add support audio and video tracks to GStreamer media backend.
• Properly expose video and audio elements to accessibility.
• Fix invalid cairo matrix when drawing too small surfaces.
• Avoid extra copy when drawing images using cairo.
• Do not omit playback rate when seeking in GStreamer media backend.
• Several build fixes on non-linux platforms.

What is new in version 2.2.3:

• Render AC layers also when using GTK+ 2 in WebKit1.
• Avoid extra copy when drawing images in cairo backend.
• Fix return value of webkit_web_view_get_view_source_mode() in WebKit1.
• Fix scrolling in combo boxes when the dropdown menu is larger than the screen.
• Remove Chromium as user agent and claim to be Safari in OS X.
• Fix a crash in the WebProcess when visiting www.pressure.co.uk.
• Fix a crash JavaScriptcore with certain Google Drive documents.
• Fix a crash in JavaScriptcore when running peacekeeper benchmark in 32 bit platforms.
• Fix the build with freetype >= 2.5.1.

What is new in version 2.2.2:

• Fix a crash when printing via JavaScript in WebKit2.
• Enable text edition undo/redo operations support in WebKit2.
• Fix the build on non-linux platforms.

What is new in version 2.3.1:

• Add WebKit2 API for TLS errors.
• Make EventTarget interface introspectable in GObject DOM bindings.
• Expose WheelEvent in the GObject DOM bindings API.
• Generate API documentation for GObject DOM bindings.
• Respect image orientation by default.
• Enable text edition undo/redo operations support in WebKit2.
• Add suppport for blob URLs to GStreamer media backend.
• Add support for subtitles.
• Allow running the web process with an arbitrary prefix command in debug builds.
• Expose image links properly to accessibility.
• Expose title and alternative text for links in image maps to accessibility.
• Cancel the current active WebKitAuthenticationRequest on load fail.
• Fix several memory leaks.

Requirements:

• GNOME